Tailoring Coaching to Personalized Bloodwork

Introduction

In part two of this series, co-founder Dan Garner explained how the Vitality Blueprint platform removes the constraints that limit performance and health, what sets it apart from other bloodwork-based systems, and why now is the perfect time for a new era to unlock human potential. In this week’s post, we ask Dan about the importance of doing the basics well, which functional area he thinks is overlooked, and how Vitality tackles issues like low testosterone from every angle. 

Interview

While some of the interventions Vitality suggests are specific, others – like eating more protein or sleeping more – are quite simple. Why is it so important for people to do the basics well?

It's important to do the basics really well because they have the biggest effects on physiology. These are things that you have to do, like stay hydrated, manage stress, sleep well, and eat protein and fiber. You can't have too many calories. If they’re recommended on the Vitality platform it is because the recommendation is effective. And just because it's basic, it doesn't mean you're doing it consistently.

If it's flagging as a problem, you need to focus on it more. The beautiful thing about bloodwork is it doesn't lie to you. A machine did 20,000 calculations and said you need more protein based on your unique physiology. Higher frequency bloodwork resurfaces the areas of your life that you've let slip because things got busy. You need something to tell you that objectively. 

Which functional area do you feel is typically overlooked and how does it impact performance?

I could say all of them because the theory of constraints exists for a reason. If one of them is off, then the whole thing is not 100%. But, if I had to pick just one, I would say gut health because it's what feeds everything else. For example, if I want to make thyroid hormone, then I'm going to need tyrosine, selenium, zinc, and iodine. What happens if I don't optimally digest and absorb these things? My thyroid can’t produce that hormone. The same thing goes for testosterone. For dopamine production, we're going to need tyrosine and vitamin B6. On that same metabolic pathway, if we have enough copper and vitamin C, we can convert that dopamine into epinephrine or norepinephrine. 

These come from micronutrients and macronutrients. You aren't what you eat, you are what you eat and actually absorb. So if I don't have an optimally functioning gut, that is the epicenter. If it's not optimal, nothing else can be. There's nothing free in physiology. If I want to make any chemical, enzyme, protein, or neurotransmitter, that all comes from something. We can't create things out of thin air.If our gut is limiting our ability to efficiently process or produce those, everything else falls. 

Beyond that, the research is finding new connections to the gut every day. Most people know about the gut-brain-axis. Well, did you know about the gut-heart and gut-thyroid axes? The gut is also connected to the immune system. Every day it seems like the list grows adding more and more weight to the importance of gut health. 

It's interesting that you mentioned testosterone in this way, as many people go right to injections if they get tested for “low T.”

We aren’t against drugs at Vitality, but I am against people not needing drugs and still using them.. Testosterone's a pretty good example, and that’s why we do our full analysis. Many things in research have been shown to negatively affect testosterone. If someone has elevated levels of stress, that is going to raise cortisol. Cortisol is antagonistic to testosterone. So the higher the 24-hour under-the-curve measurements of cortisol are, the lower testosterone is going to be. We also know that poor sleep dramatically lowers testosterone. 

If someone has poor gut health, they’re not being served the raw materials to make testosterone. The gut is typically the epicenter for inflammation too, and that’s been demonstrated to run antagonistic with testosterone. Things like C-reactive protein and erythrocyte sedimentation rate are acute and chronic markers of inflammation, and they've both been demonstrated to lower testosterone, as does lead exposure and other heavy metals. We can look at the globulin biomarker in basic bloodwork and micronutrient insufficiencies, like zinc and magnesium. They’re both critically linked to testosterone and over half of the population is low in magnesium. 

So when someone's got symptoms of low T, they aren’t automatically doomed to having to do TRT for the rest of their life. There is a very strong possibility that there is a bigger picture that needs to be taken into consideration. Do you possibly have heavy metal exposure, stress, inflammation, poor sleep quality, a lack of micronutrients, and/or a lack of gut health? Bloodwork can give you that perspective and help inform what is actually needed.

Are there any other issues with going straight to medication like exogenous testosterone instead of trying the recommendations Vitality makes? 

When people start to feel off they tend to focus on their symptoms and quick fixes for those symptoms. Your symptoms are your body’s cry for help. When you have symptoms, it's trying to tell you that something's wrong. The trick is knowing between the root of the problem and a symptom of it. Bloodwork and help make that determination.

If what you are feeling is the actual problem, then by all means fix it. But if it is just a symptom and there are more factors at play, take the time to fix the whole problem. Missing the whole picture can potentially lead to ongoing damage because a simple symptom was addressed and not the actual problem. There is a chance that straight medication can be avoided. How did you decide which biomarkers to include and which to ignore? 

Vitality looks specifically at blood markers. So, we’re not looking at things like thyroid antibodies. We are staying out of the world of disease screening and staying in the world of performance. The Vitality biomarkers are chosen in a way to give a complete screen on the performance level of all systems and organs in the body. 

Check back soon for part 4, in which Dan shares more about biomarkers, functional areas, and how Vitality Blueprint takes into account the differences and commonalities between male and female physiology.